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Narrative Gaps In Elfen Lied
Narrative Gaps are inevitable. No story can ever be told completely. The effort to write and read such a thing staggers the mind, and even if this effort were made, not every answer can be provided. A work's creators choose a focus on different levels and stay in large part with that. Elfen Lied focuses mainly on about ten to twelve major characters, and really only on five or six of those for the most part. Most actions occur in three or four locations, with two of those seeing the vast bulk of the scenes. Kamakura, Japan, is the center of this universe. While the struggle against the Diclonius in Belgium or British Columbia might make for a very good story, such will never be the focus of this series. Invariably, an answer provided by even the most comprehensive work may simply open up more questions, perhaps even many more. This is to say nothing of the answers that dissatisfy those taking in the work. A decision must be made about who, what, when, where, why and how, and in the root of the word decision is the Latin word for 'To Cut'. A work is not bad or poor for having narrative gaps. However, usually proceeding in an inverse to the passion for the series, such a gap can be badly distracting, diminishing affection for the piece or increasing strong dislike. For this article, a narrative gap will be defined as an unknown, a plothole, an inconsistency or something that truly does not fit into the story because of other conditions of the fictional universe as stated or implied in the series. Certain things are plainly not narrative gaps. A wish that a character had met a different fate is an opinion. That we don't learn the fates of people like the Bakery or Crepes Merchant is just something the story chose not to cover, and their and other similar characters' fates do not change the outcome or the future history of that world. The true fate of Aiko Takada or Nana's possible connection to Number 3 do fall in here, but must be shown with broad qualifiers, and are more fan controversies than narrative gaps, and in any event are fully covered elsewhere. Explanations for these things can be extrapolated or guessed at, some much more easily than others. What will be noted here is a lack of direct or often any explanation in-series. Items placed in here as narrative gaps must meet a high if flexible standard and will be subject to user scrutiny. As the Good Doctors are apt to say, Spoilers! 'Plot Examples' Elements in the manga series final chapters *The identity of Nyuu Junior's mother is left directly unstated. However, she is identical to Yuka and is Kouta's daughter, meaning Okamoto most likely chose to state her mother's identity through her appearance rather than in words. *Nyuu Junior's exact age has context problems. She would have been born after the worldwide birth ban was lifted, this perhaps as much as two years after Lucy's death. We first see her with her father, ten years after Lucy died, where he tells her he played at that place when he was her age; in fact, if she is eight at most, then he was two to three years older. Though Kouta was likely speaking broadly, when he lightly chastises Nyuu for going to that area before without him, she counters that he just said he did the same at her age. While children going out on their own at a relatively young age is common in Japan, Kouta perhaps felt that she was below that threshold, and also had not informed her parents she was doing so, again raising questions about her age. * The final fates of much of the main cast and major characters, aside from Kouta, are not expanded upon in the final chapter. * The clash between Yuka and her mother over whether Nana could remain with them is never resolved or brought up again after the first instance. However, Nana is still living at the Maple House in one part of the story's ending and is shown to still be part of their lives. Because it is brought up in-story and is not merely an inference, it meets the criteria for a plothole, but only just, since it is easily resolved by other story elements. * In the manga conclusion, Kouta states that the World Health Organization placed a birth ban on Humans to prevent the creation of more Diclonius. The W.H.O. does not possess any authority to enact any of its policy recommendations; it can only advise members of the United Nations on health matters and offer suggestions. Nowhere in Elfen Lied's narrative is there any mention of conditions that would give the W.H.O. power over that decision, which member nations would make for themselves, even in the direst crises imaginable. * While several explanations can be inferred, the apparent final surprise of Lucy/Nyu's true name brings to mind the question of who knew it and who didn't. Kouta, despite spending a day or so with this girl, apparently never learned it, as even when his memories were restored, he only learned it a decade later. While Kurama and the Kakuzawas did not have an interest in humanizing Lucy, knowledge of her true name and origins would seem natural, though such information in and of itself would be far less relevant than knowledge of Lucy's nature and powers. If Kurama and Professor Kakuzawa learned of her partly from the report of the murders at the orphanage and if she was reported as missing, then part of that report would likely contain her true name. While they and Lucy seemed to have little use for that original name, it was seemingly kept from only two groups: Those dwelling in Maple House and the readers themselves. Of course, "Kaede" is possibly not her "true" name at all, as she was abandoned as an infant and was perhaps only given a name upon being sent to the orphanage. Chief Kakuzawa makes no mention of what name her mother would have known her by, so the name is lost with the lack of Lucy's father in the story and the deaths of her mother and Chief Kakuzawa. * A major plot point as the series ends is Lucy's final rejection of the Kakuzawas' agenda. This is based at least in part on her sensing that, their ancestral claims aside, they are not true Diclonius like her. While part of this is also based on affection for those at Maple House and her love for Kouta, the former has an alternate interpretation. She could not know for certain the Kakuzawas' claims were false, since by their own account, their supposed non-Human bloodline was diluted, and she had never encountered such a person before, since characters are either Diclonius or they are not. Of those and many more unseen, she and her brother are the only ones capable of creating children. There would in effect be no way she could compare a pure bloodline to a diluted one. Again though, her rejection was not only based in this idea. * In the final chapter, as the ladies of Maple House greet Kouta as he leaves the hospital, Nana is seen without headwear of any kind, her horns out for all to see. While she may have been under some form of protection arranged by Kurama, this is never indicated, and this exposure could have concievably imperiled her during the tensions to come. * Not truly a plothole but seemingly a delieberate cliffhanger left to the readers' imagination is the standing of Kurama and Nana's relationship. Debate in this instance centers on whether Kurama was set to tell Nana (gently) that she was being silly about becoming his wife, or if he would allow for the future possibility of it. The various aspects of this possibility are explored in this article. * Again seeming like a deliberate cliffhanger are the stated, depicted but unresolved fates of Anna Kakuzawa and the Agent. Alive but in the underground grotto that once housed Anna's monstrous shell, their survival is by no means certain. The place was said to be oppressive, radioactive and sealed off by the sinking of the island facility. Add to that, in order to be rescued, someone would have to realize that they were alive, where they were, and how they might be gotten to safely. Still, the Agent was depicted as resourceful, and her fear of being alone would have her keeping Anna alive until a possible lucky break came their way. * Less of a cliffhanger, yet still an unresolved question, is the eventual status of the relationship between Bando and Mayu, the controversies of this gone into elsewhere. Also in question is just how cybernetics were able to keep a man so destroyed by Lucy alive and mobile. In this case, the fate of Diclonius Silpelit # [[Number 28|28 offers a clue about the mechanics of how this might have happened. Yet also stated in Number 28's narrative was the fact that her attachments could only keep her alive for about a week. Whether Bando's life expectancy is similarly shortened is never brought up or addressed. * Another supposedly dead individual possibly revealed to be alive is Lucy's only other childhood friend, Aiko Takada. In Wanta's wanderings, a poster seeming to show her as a young woman is seen, with an advert for her art show. Yet of all those revealed to have possibly survived certain death, only she is not shown fully and directly. Elements in the anime * In Anime Episode 12, Kouta and Nyu find the police and soldiers at a barricade at least unconscious, if not dead. The DRI staff depended on this barricade to keep civilians away from the island. Nothing ever is shown or said to indicate, that say, Bando did this at the behest of Kurama, or anything of the sort. The most likely reason for so many people being left unconscious is that Nana incapacitated them, as she arrives in front of Mariko, Shirakawa, Isobe, and a team of SAT soldiers on the bridge leading to Enoshima, reachable by the path blocked by the barricade. While perhaps similar to her ability to disable the vectors of other Diclonius, Nana is never shown to have such an ability, which is also similar to Lucy's more lethal manipulation of blood vessels in the brain. Unfortunately, this is speculation and is never directly answered in canon. * In Anime Episode 2, Yuka has a still-image flashback to when she saw Kouta and his family off at the train station for the last time. Accompanying her is a man in a kimono. Yet later on, when this same scene is replayed in full and animated, she is alone. In the similar manga scene, she is accompanied by her mother. Yuka's mother does not appear in the anime, while even the broadly implied fate of her father is never broached in either version. It seems likely this was a mere error during early production of the anime, but who this man even might have been is a mystery. * In Anime Episode 13, Yuka states that Kouta spent one year in a hospital following Lucy's murder of his family. It is not stated what sort of hospital it was, and though Yuka states it was for shock, it is also unknown if this was for the physical or mental shock. If he had been ten to eleven when this occurred, and possibly/likely as old as 20 when he returned at the start of the series, then seven years of his life are unaccounted for. Not even the vaguest mention of who he stayed with or where he stayed is brought up. Also left out is the criteria for releasing him from care when his memories had not yet returned. In the manga, no information for Kouta's years between the murders and his return to Kamakura is offered. Whole Series Elements * Ages of the main characters; aside from Mayu's age, none of the main characters are given clear ages aside from Nozomi, who must be somewhere between 16-18 since she is in high school. Lucy's age is assumed by Kouta to be 15 (which he notes would be Kanae's age if she were alive), but when they are children, Lucy is as tall as Kouta, if not taller. Due to Lucy being in her Nyu personality at the time, he perhaps based this assumption on her behavior or incorrectly assumed it based on her appearance (which is faulty judgement since many people can be older than they look or vice versa). Kouta and Yuka also must be around 20 years old for them to be allowed to adopt Mayu under Japanese law even with her mother's permission, as 20 years of age is the age of majority wherein one is a fully legal adult, and minors are not allowed to adopt children. Since Mayu attends public school, it is impossible that her guardians would not be on file within the school system. The narrative doesn't clarify whether they can adopt her because of their age or if Yuka's mother perhaps took up the adoption instead, but the simplest answer is that either one or both of them is of the proper age. Following this train of thought, Kakuzawa's threat of kidnapping when he took Nyu from them would hold more weight to a pair of adults than a pair considered to be minors in the legal system. Since very little information is given, all of the above is left to conjecture to find answers. * The depictions of Lucy's puppy vary. In some sequences, the dog looks very much like Wanta, while in others it is seen to be brown with patches of white fur. * While easily dismissed as subjective to young Lucy's frenzied state of mind, certain story elements concerning the girl who befriends Lucy at the orphanage can be placed in here. Her true motivation and her possible half-hidden smile (again explained any number of ways) aside, the gory aftermath of Lucy's outrage over her puppy's killing seems to show the girl died by decapitation. Lucy later imagines her as an undead taunter with a hole blown through her head but still attached. The earlier scene is unclear, and again, Lucy's state of mind makes this worth noting only on a technical level. * After Lucy escapes from Professor Kakuzawa, she is once again struggling to avoid reverting to Nyu. By the next time she is seen only a few chapters later, this seems to no longer be a concern. * No specific information about the line of blood relation (or even if there truly is one) between Kouta, Yuka and Kanae is ever offered up. If one of each of their parents are siblings, it is not known who, though this would be needed for the three to be first cousins. If two of their parents were first cousins themselves, then the three would be at most third cousins. As is mentioned elsewhere, there is simply no knowledge of the fates of Kouta and Kanae's mother or Yuka's father. * No mention is made of the fate of Mayu's true father, or of her mother and stepfather after she leaves them for good. Given the acrimony and pain of her departure, this is hardly surprising. * The woman who claimed Wanta from Mayu, saying he was actually her dog, James, is never seen again after Wanta returns to Mayu. While the vanishing of such an ancillary character is not truly noteworthy, in her one scene she was vociferous and determined to reclaim what she saw as her dog. While any number of explanations exist (including Mayu being on the lookout for this woman), Mayu was known to the police in the area, and her new home would have been registered. This at least calls into question either the woman's veracity or her actual attachment to a dog she had already lost once. * When Nozomi is first introduced, it is said that her family opposed her singing, feeling instead she should train to take over the family business. In a special manga chapter focusing on her, only her father is seen, and not only is the business or other members of the family not brought up, but his sometimes-violent opposition is said to stem from health concerns regarding her mother's death. * While many factors can and do rob gifted singers of their voice, Soprano Dramatico, the specific throat flaw said to give and then rob Nozomi and her mother of their singing voices (perhaps their speaking voices as well), does not exist in the real world. Further, her father cites that the Japanese throat is not made for opera, a claim that is wholly unsupported. * Most characters in the series have either only a given name, or only a family name. Some few otherwise notable characters have no name at all; as stated above, this may include the series main character. * In the anime, Kurama leaves a voice recording in Nana's escape pod explaining his actions in sending her away. In the manga version, however, he leaves a note which the unworldly Nana should not be able to read. * Thankfully for the residents of Maple House, none seemed to have been arrested or held and questioned for harboring a fugitive so wanted and dangerous, the Japanese government felt it necessary to invade a civilian home and neighborhood. While the government's desire to keep things quiet was also in play, this just as easily could have been achieved by locking them all up. While the residents' cooperation could be inferred after the fact, since they had no information to bargain with, they would at least be at peril of imprisonment, yet even as a possibility, this is never mentioned. * After rescuing Mayu and Nana from the vicious Unknown Man, Bando offers to bury the mutilated body of Number 28. Yet as he leaves Maple House, he at last encounters Lucy as Nyu, and attempting to kill her, instead awakens the Lucy personality. The two decide to settle their feud at Yuigahama Beach, and proceed there to do battle. Given the immediacy of this confrontation, including Nana still being ill from the toxins fired into her by Unknown Man's specialized crossbow, and Bando's fate from that battle, there seems to be little to no time for him to have buried Number 28, even in a makeshift grave. The possibility exists that when Bando's body was taken away (presumably by government forces opposed to the Kakuzawas), Number 28's remains were taken as well. Analysis and reverse-engineering of her life support could explain * Near the end of the series, Chief Kakuzawa shows Lucy her half-brother, the only Male Diclonius seen in either version of the series. Kakuzawa declares the boy to be rare, almost unheard of. No reason, scientific or science-fictional is ever asserted as to why the overwhelming majority of Diclonius shown or inferred were female. However, since all Diclonius except for Lucy and her brother were sterile, this point, while a curiosity, is effectively moot. * Chief Kakuzawa's plan to erase Humanity by causing all future births to be Diclonius seems to have concerns. If the Diclonius being born are Silpelit-only, then even if Lucy had agreed to join him, she and her brother could not have even begun to reasonably repopulate the Earth with fertile Diclonii, all concerns about inbreeding aside. Given that he wished to control this situation, it seems unlikely he would allow other "Primary" Diclonius to exist, if they did or if they were to emerge by accident. This could be chalked up to the Chief's other delusions corrupting his logic on these questions as well. * The alignment of Doctor Kurama against the plans of Chief Kakuzawa does not actually depict his learning of or joining [[Saseba. Yet during the Mariko arc, he is obviously in command of military forces not under the control of the Chief. It would seem likely he was recruited by his former subordinate Shirakawa, secretly a Saseba mole (at least in the manga), but again this is never stated or implied after Kurama sends Nana away to save her life and prepares to flee the Diclonius Research Institute. 'Timeframe Examples ' * Mayu's time of living homeless is vague at best. It simply could not have been much more than a few months, since her clothes still fit her and are still intact enough to be worn. Yet she is known to the local merchants, so it could not have been too short a time as well. A related issue is exactly how far away her mother's house is from where she fled to and from Maple House. Mayu had to register at a new school, yet Kouta and Yuka found her mother easily once Mayu was willing to let them contact her, and they made no indication the trip was long or expensive. * The period of time that Anna Kakuzawa spent as the monstrous oracle is very indeterminate. She appears to be roughly the same age as before her operations, which could indicate either a short timeframe or her true body being kept in stasis while she was the oracle. In any event, no narrative clues exist as to even a rough period of time in which Chief Kakuzawa would have made his request of her. * The capture, captivity and eventual suicide of Lucy's mother at minimum pushes the timeframe and what few narrative clues exist to near the breaking point, though it can still work. Chief Kakuzawa asserts that once Lucy was known of, finding her mother was his next step. Yet at no time does he indicate whether it was merely the knowledge that a Diclonius Queen existed or the actual capture of Lucy herself that precipitated this. The former is possible, since, if his son and Kurama knew of Lucy from her class photo, they might also know her name (while never referencing it). Once that name was known, a search for a woman who had such a child (presuming Lucy was born in a hospital or had other legal record of her birth) and was known to be inquiring about her would narrow the search dramatically. No timeframe can be gleaned of how long Kurama's search for Lucy took. It is somewhat difficult to imagine Lucy's mother being taken too far prior to Lucy's own captivity, and her being taken sometime after this seems to make more sense. * Also a puzzle is how old Lucy's half-brother really was, especially when placed against Lucy's captivity and the timeframe of the series itself. If the rules governing aging were the same for both siblings, then the boy Kakuzawa presented to Lucy could have been seven at most, and then only if every last factor broke the way of his conception and birth. In short, the search for Lucy would had to have been nearly a year in duration, with her mother captured sometime during the search. She would have to be impregnated almost immediately after this. The series events would then have to stretch over more than three years, when the depicted passage of seasons does not support this. The greater likelihood is that he was less than five, since not all of the events needed for him to be older would likely fall into line. The boy seemed quite tall for someone who likely could not have been that old, and who his father presented as ready for imminent mating. Adding to the confusion in this case is the directly depicted and inferred height of Chief Kakuzawa, perhaps one of the tallest characters in the series. If the boy comes up to his waist, this implies an age past five years. The boy's mental maturity is made impossible to measure due to the control device his father implanted him with. As shown with the viable clones of Mariko, use of these devices inhibits coherent thought. * While context clues and inferences from the limited account by Kouta concerning the Diclonius War provide some guidance, some questions are raised by what is said. Chiefly, it seems, though it is never stated, that the Diclonius born from Chief Kakuzawa's engineered virus were attacking much earlier in their lives than Diclonius born from Lucy and other horned girls vector-based infections, who seemed to gain their powers at three chronological years of age. While certain time points are mentioned, the timeframe of a war said to place Humans on the edge of extinction is not made clear. It seems likely that the rules stated in-series for Diclonius aging and power usage did not apply for those created by the weaponized virus. * One of the major settings for the series after Maple House itself is the Diclonius Research Institute, and while not truly a plothole, questions are raised about how and when it came into being. Lucy could only have been infecting males on a meaningful scale since the end of the summer she first met Kouta; her powers only fully manifested shortly before this. It would have been at least nine months after this that the very first horned children would have been born, and, by Kurama's and Yu Kakuzawa's accounts, three years after that before their powers manifested. Since not every one of these children would automatically begin killing right after this, it would seem odd that such a large facility already existed to contain them. While an existing building could have been repurposed from the original National Institute on Human Evolution, one so large would require at least some construction and quite a bit of refitting. If Lucy was captured five years after meeting Kouta and taken to a facility already built, built-up, staffed and ready for her, then this leaves a very brief period of time for this facility to have been planned for, its construction or enhancement financed and authority enacted, and its holding areas essentially filled up to the point of ordering further births euthanized. Add to this, Kurama was recruited to work there when the facility was already completed. It is hard to ascertain, absent a real or perceived immediate threat, why this would have been made as it was depicted. Category:Series Information Category:Story Related Category:Manga Category:Anime Category:Plotholes Category:Essays